* ^ ^^"^ ^ .^^ (^^r ""^ A OLD SPORTS AND SPORTSMEN. C^>2^^ OLD SPORTS AND SPORTSMEN WITH SKETCHES OF SQUIRE FORESTER AND HIS WHIPPER-IN TOM MOODY (" You all knew Tom Moody the Whipper-in well "). By JOHN RANDALL, F.G.S. AUTHOR OF "the SEVERN VALLEY," ETC. LONDON : VIRTUE & CO., 26, IVY LANE SALOP : BUNNY and EVANS ; and RANDALL, Bookseller, MADELEY 1873 . LONDOX PRINTED BY TIRTUE AND CO., CITY BOAD. PEEFACE. It is too mucli to expect that these pages will altogether escape criticism ; my object will have been gained, however, if I have succeeded in collect- ing and placing intelligibly before the reader such noticeable facts as are interesting matters of local history. Should it appear that there has been imported into the work too many details touching the earlier features of the country, the little that is generally known on the subject, the close connection of cause and effect, and the influences the old forests may have had in perpetuating a love of sport among some members of a family whose name appears to have been derived from pursuits connected therewith, must be my excuse. Dr. Arnold once remarked upon the close connection existing between nature and mankind, and how each in turn is affected by the other, whilst a living writer, and a deeper VI PREFACE. thinker, Las gone still furtlier, in saying tliat '* He is great wlio is wliat lie is from nature." Of course it is not intended to claim greatness for Squire Forester in tlie sense in wliicli tlie word is ordinarily used, or qualities, even, differing very much from those bearing the impress of the common mould of humanity ; but simply that he was what he was from nature, from pre-disposition, and from living at the time he did. Also, that he was in many respects a fair representative of the squirearchy of the period, of a class of squires in whom we recognise features discoverable in those in the enjoyment of the same natural vigour in our own day, but who may have chosen different fields for its development. It did not appear to come within the scope of the work to enter to the same extent upon the doings of other sportsmen of Squire Forester's time, or to dilate upon those of gentlemen who subsequently distinguished themselves. It would have required many additional pages, for instance, to have done justice to the exploits of the first Lord Forester ; or to those of the present right honourable proprietor of Willey, who upon retiring from the mastership of the Belvoir hounds was presented with a massive piece of plate, representing an incident which hap- PREFACE. Vll pened in connection mth tlie Hunt. Of both iN'imrod lias written in tlie highest terms. The names of several whose deeds the same felicitous writer has described in connection with Shropshire will occur to the reader, as Mr. Stubbs, of Beck- bury ; Mr. Childe, of Kinlet ; Mr. Boycott, of Eudge — who succeeded Sir BeUingham Grraham on his giving up the Shifnal country ; Lord Wenlock ; Squire Corbett, and the Squire of Halston ; names which, as Colonel Apperley has very justly said, will never be forgotten by the sporting world. As the reader will perceive, I have simply acted upon the principle laid down in the '' Natural History of Selborne" by the E-ev. Gilbert White, who says, " If the stationary men would pay some attention to the district in which they reside, and would pubKsh their thoughts respecting the objects that surround them, from such materials might be drawn the most complete county history." This advice influenced me in undertaking the ^' Severn Yalley," and I have endeavoured to keep the same in view now, by utilising the materials, and by using the best means at command for bringing together facts such as may serve to illustrate them, and which may not be unlooked for in a work of the kind. VUl PREFACE. Since the old Forest Periods, and since old Squire Forester's day even, tlie manners and the customs of the nation have changed ; but the old love of sport discoverable in our ancestors, and inherited more or less by them from theirs, remains as a link connecting past generations with the present. It matters not, it appears to me, whether either the writer or the reader indulges himself in such sports or not, he may be equally willing to recall the " Olden Time," with its instances of rough and ready pluck and daring, and to listen to an old song, made by an aged pate, " Of a fine old English gentleman who had a great estate." Shropshire and the surrounding counties during the past century had, as we all know, many old English gentlemen with large estates, who kept up their brave old houses at pretty liberal rates; but few probably exercised the virtue of hospitality more, or came nearer to the true type of the country gentle- man of the period than the hearty old Willey Squire. Differ as we may in our views of the chase, we must admit that such amusements served to relieve the monotony of country life, and to make time pass pleasantly, which but for horses and hounds, and the PREFACE. IX opportunities they afforded of intercourse with neigh- bours, must have hung heavily on a country gentle- man's hands a hundred years ago. It is, moreover, it appears to me, to this love of sport, in one form or another, that we of this gene- ration are indebted for those grand old woods which now delight the eye, and which it would have been a calamity to have lost. The green fertility of fields answering with laughing plenty to human industry is truly pleasrag ; but now that blue-bells, and violets, foxgloves and primroses are being driven from the hedgerows, and these themselves are fast disappearing before the advances of agricultural science, it is gratifying to think that there are wastes and wilds where weeds may still resort — where the perfumes of flowers, the songs of birds, and the music of the breeze may be enjoyed. That the love of nature which the out-door exercises of our ancestors did so much to foster and perpetuate still survives is evident. How often, for instance, among dwellers in towns does the weary spirit pant for the fields, that it may wing its flight with the lark through the gushing sunshine, and join in the melody that goes pealing through the fretted cathedral of the woods, whilst caged by the demands of the hour, or kept X PREFACE. prisoner by the shop, the counter, or the machine ? Spring, with its regenerating influences, may wake the clods of the valley into life, may wreathe the black twigs with their garb of green and white, and give to the trees their livery ; but men who should read the lessons they teach know nothing of the rejoicings that gladden the glades and make merry the woods. Nevertheless, proof positive that the love of nature — scourged, crushed, and overlaid, it may be, with anxious cares for existence — never dies out may be found in customs still lingering among us. In the blackest iron districts, where the surface is one great ink-blotch, where clouds of dust and columns of smoke obscure the day, where scoria heaps, smouldering fires, and never-ceasing flames give a scorched aspect to the scene, the quickening influences that renew creation are felt, teaching men — ignorant as Wordsworth's " Peter Bell *' — to take part in the festival of the year. When the sap has risen in the tree when the south wind stirs the young leaves, and the mechanism of the woods is in motion, when the blackbird has taken his place in the bush, and the thrush has perched itself upon the spray, in the month of pelting showers and laughing sunshine, when the first note of the cuckoo is heard PREFACE. XI from the ash in the hedge-row or the wild cherry in the woods, an old custom stiU proclaims a holiday in honour of his arrival. When the last lingering feature of winter has yanished; when brooks, no longer hoarse, sink their voices to a tinkling sweet- ness, flooding mead and dingle with their music ; when the merry, merry month, although no longer celebrated for its floral shows and games as formerly, arrives, the May-bush may be seen over the door of the village smithy and on the heads of horses on the road. It would have been of little use passing acts of Parliament, like the one which has just become law, for the preservation of members of the feathered tribes, if their native woods had not been preserved to us by sportsmen. To have lost our woods would have been to have lost the spring and summer resi- dences of migratory birds : to have lost the laugh of the woodpecker, the songs of the blackbird and the thrush, the woodlark's thrilling melody, and the nightingale's inimitable notes, to say nothing of those faint soothing shadowings which steal upon one from these leafy labyrinths of nature. As some one taking deeper views has said : — Xll PREFACE. " There lie around] Thy daily walk great store of beauteous things, Each in its separate place most fair, and all Of many parts disposed most skilfuUy, Making in combination wonderful An individual of a higher kind ; And that again in. order ranging well With its own fellows, till thou rise at length Up to the majesty of this grand world ; — Hard task, and seldom reached by mortal souls. For frequent intermission and neglect Of close communion with the humblest things ; But in rare moments, whether memory Hold compact with invention, or the door Of heaven hath been a little pushed aside, Methinks I can remember, after hours Of unpremeditated thought in woods." CONTENTS. PAGE Introduction . . 1 CHAPTEE I. THE MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS. The Hawk an Acquisition to Sportsmen — Hawk aeries — Hawks according to Degrees — Brook and other kinds of Hawking — Hawking and Hunting — A Shropshire His- torian's charge against the Conqueror — Bishops and their Clergj- as much given to the Sport as Laymen — The Rector of Madeley— The Merrie Days, &c 8 CHAPTER II. MORFE FOREST. Morfe Forest one of the Five Royal Forests of Shropshire — Its History and Associations — Early British, Roman, Danish, and Norman Mementoes — Legends and Historical Inci- dents — Forest Wastes — Old Names — Hermitage HlQ — Stanmore Grove — Essex Fall — Foresters — Old Forest Lodge, &c 17 CHAPTER m. ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. Royal Chase of Shirlot — Extent — Places disafforested — Hayes — Foresters — Hunting Lodge — Priors of Wenlock — Curious Tenures — Encroachments upon Woods by Iron-making Operations — Animals that have disappeared — Reaction due to a love of Sport — What the Country would have lost — " The Merrie Greenwood "—Old Forest Trees, &c. . 31 XIV CONTENTS. PAGE CHAPTEU IV. THE WREKIN FOREST AND THE FORESTERS. The Wrekin Forest and the Foresters — Hermit of Mount St. Gilbert — Poachers upon the King's Preserves — Extent of the Forest — Haye of Wellington — Eobert Forester — Per- quisites — Hunting Matches — Singular Grant to John Forester — Sir Walter Scott's Anthony Forster a Member of the Shropshire Forester Family — Anthony Forster Lord of the Manor of Little Wenlock, and related to the Foresters of Sutton and Bridgnorth —Anthony Foster altogether a different Character to what Sir Walter Scott represents him 54 CHAPTER V. WILLEY. Willey, Close Neighbour to the Royal Chase of Shirlot — Ety- mology of the Name — Domesday— The Willileys — The Lacons— The Welds and the Foresters— The Old Hall— Cumnor Hall as described by Sir Walter Scott — Every- thing Old and Quaint — How Willey came into possession of the Foresters 70 CHAPTER VI. THE WILLEY SQUIRE. The Willey Squire — Instincts and Tendencies — Atmosphere of the times favourable for their development— Thackeray's Opinion — Style of Hunting — Dawn of the Golden Age of the Sport, &c 77 CHAPTER VII. THE WILLEY KENNELS. The Willey Kennels— Colonel Apperley on Hunting a hun- dred years ago — Character of the Hounds — Portraits of Favourites — Original Letters 83 CONTENTS. XV PAGB CHAPTER VIII. THE WILLEY LONG EUNS. The Willey Long Runs— Dibdin's fifty miles no figure of speecli— From the Wrekin to the Clee— The Squire's Breakfast— Phoebe Higgs— Doggrel Ditties— Old Tinker —Moody's Horse falls dead— Run by Moonlight . .93 CHAPTER IX. bachelor's hall. Its Quaint Interior — An Old Friend's Memory — Crabbe's Peter at Ilford Hall— Singular Time-pieces — A Meet at Hangster's Gate— Jolly Doings — Dibdin at Dinner — Broseley Pipes — Parson Stephens in his Shirt — The Par- son's Song 102 CHAPTER X. y THE WILLEY RECTOR AND OTHER OF THE SQUIRE's FRIENDS. The Squire's Friends and the Rector more fully drawn — Turner — Wilkinson — Harris — The Rev. Michael Pye Stephens — His Relationship to the Squire — In the Com- mission of the Peace — The Parson and the Poacher — A Fox-hunting Christening 113 CHAPTER XI. THE WILLEY WHIPPER-IN. The Willey Whipper-in— Tom's Start in Life— His Pluck and Perseverance — Up hill and down dale — Adventures with the Buff-coloured Chaise — His own Wild Favourite — His Drinking Horn — Who-who-hoop — Good Temper — Never Married — Hangster's Gate — Old Coaches — Tom gone to Earth — Three View Halloos at the Grave — Old Boots 124 XVI CONTENTS. PAOE CHAPTER XII. SUCCESS OF THE SONG. Dibdin's Song — Dibdin and the Squire good fellows well met — Moody a character after Dibdin's own heart — The Squire's Gift — Incledon — The Shropshire Fox- hunters on the Stage at Drury Lane 140 CHAPTER XIII. THE WILLEY SQUIRE MEMBER FOR WENLOCK. The Willey Squire recognises the duty of his position, and be- comes Member for TVenlock — Addison's View of "Whig Jockeys and Tory Fox-hunters — State of Parties — Pitt in Power — " Fiddle-Faddle" — Local Improvements — The Squire Mayor of "Wenlock — The Mace now carried before the Chief Magistrate 147 CHAPTER XIV. THE SQUIRE AND HIS VOLUNTEERS. The Squire and his Volunteers — Community of Feeling — Threats of Invasion — " We'll follow the Sqidre to Hell, if necessary" — The Squire's Speech — His Birthday — His Letter to the Shrewsbury Chronicle — Second Corps — Boney and Beacons — The Squire in a Rage — The Duke of York and Prince of Orange come down . . .154 CHAPTER XV. THE WILLEY SQUIRE AMONG HIS NEIGHBOURS. The Squire among his Neighbours — Sir Roger de Coverley — Anecdotes — Gentlemen nearest the fire in the Lower Re- gions—Food Riots — The Squire quells the Mob — His Virtues and his Failings — Influences of the Times — His career draws to a close — His wish for Oid Friends and Servants to follow him to the Grave — To be buried in the dusk of the evening — His Favourite Horse to be shot — His estates left to his cousin, Cecil "Weld, the First Lord Forester — New Hunting Song 173 Appendix . 189 Index 201 LIST OF ILLUSTEATIONS. PAGE Lord Forester Frontispiece The Valley of the Severn 1 Trained Falgon ^ Hooded Falcon ^ MoRFE Forest 1' Stag 17 Boar Hunt in Morfe Forest 21 Fallow Deer ^^ Deer Leap ^^ Chapter House of Wenlock Priory 38 "Waterfall ** Forest Scenery ^6 Lady Oak at Cressage 50 The Badger 53 Group of Deer 54 Needle's Eye 56 Deer and Young .59 Atcham Church 62 KicHARD Forester's Old Mansion . . . . .65 XVUl LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE WiLLEY Old Hall 70 The Old Squihe 77 Fayourite Dogs 83 Portrait of a Fox-houxd 93 Build WAS Abbey 100 Moody's Horn, Trencher, Cap, Saddle, &c. . . .122 Gone to Earth 122 A Meet at Hangster's GtAte 140 The First Iron Bridge 147 View of Bridgnorth 154 Willey Church 173 Valley of the Severn, near Willey. INTEODUCTION. A SIMPLE reading of the history of the earth is sufficient to show that hunting is as old as the hills — not figuratively, but literally ; and that the hunter and the hunted, one furnished with weapons of attack, and the other with means of defence, have existed from the earliest periods of creation to the present. That is, the strong have mastered the weak, and in some instances have fallen side by side, as we see by their remains. In the economy of B 2 INTRODUCTION. T^ature, the process of decay appears to have been tlie exception, rather than the rule ; with beak or tooth, or deadly claw, the strong having struck down the less defended in a never-ending arena. AVhat a hunting field, in one sense, the Old "World must have been, when creatures of strange and undefined natures infested the uncertain limits of the elements, and what encounters must have taken place in the ooze and mud periods, when monsters, enormous in stature and stretch of wing, were the implacable hunters of the air, the water, and the slime ! Nor can the inhabitants of the earth, the water, and the air, taking the term in its broad rather than in its technical sense, be said to be less hunters now, or less equipped with deadly weapons. Some have supernumerary teeth to supply the loss of such as might get broken in the fray. One strikes down its prey at a blow, another impales, its victims on thorns, and a third slays by poison. Some hunt in company, from what would seem to be a very love of sport — as crows and smaller birds give chase to the owl, apparently rejoicing in his embarrass- ment, at break of day. We need but refer to those remotely removed stages of human life illustrated by drift beds, bone INTRODUCTION. 3 caves, and shell heaps — to those primitive weapons which distinguished the lowest level of the Stone Age, weapons which every year are being brought to light by thousands — to give the genus homo a place among the hunters ; indeed one of the strongest incentives which helped on Pre-historic Man from one level to the other through the long night of the darkest ages, appears to have been that which such a pursuit supplied. To obtain the skins of animals wilder than himself he entered upon a scramble with the wolf, the bear, and the hyena. Driven by instinct or necessity to supply wartts the whole creation felt, his utmost ingenuity was put forth in the chase; and in process of time we find him having recourse to the inventive arts to enable him to carry out his designs. On the borders of lakes or on river banks, in caverns deep-seated amid primeval forest solitudes, he fashioned harpoons and arrow-heads of shell, horn, or bone, with which to repulse the attack of prowlers around his retreat and to arrest the flight of the swiftest beast he required for food ; and when he emerged from the dark night which Science has as yet but partially penetrated, when he had succeeded in pressing the horse and the door into his service, and when the 4 INTRODUCTION. cultivation of tlie soil even had removed him above the claims of hunger, he appears equally to have indulged the passion — probably for the gratification it gave and the advantages it brought in promoting that tide of full health from which is derived the pleasing consciousness of existence. Tradition, no less than archaeology and the physical history of the country itself, lead us to suppose that when those oscillations of level ceased which led to the present distribution of land and water, one-third of the face of the country was covered with wood and another with uncultivated moor, and that marsh lands were extensive. * Re- mains dug up in the valley of the Severn, and others along the wide stretch of country drained by its tributaries, together with those disinterred from the bog and the marsh, show that animals, like plants, once indigenous, have at comparatively recent periods become as extinct as Dodos in the Mauritius. Old British names in various parts of the country, particularly along the valley of the Severn, exist to show that the beaver once built its house by the stream, that the badger burrowed in its banks, and that the eagle and the falcon reared their young on the rocks above. At the same time, evidence exists INTRODUCTION. 5 to sliow tliat tlie bear and the boar ranged the forests as late as the conquest of England by the jN^ormans, whilst tbe red deer, tbe egret and tbe crane, the bittern and the bustard, remained to a period almost within living memory. River loams, river gravels, lake beds, and cave breccias, disclose hooks and spears, and sometimes fragments of nets, which show that hunting and fishing were practised by the primitive dwellers along river plains and valleys. The situations of abbeys, priories, and other monastic piles, the ruins of which here and there are seen along the banks of rivers, and the records the heads of these houses have left behind them, lead us to suppose that those who reared and those who occupied them were alive to the advantages the neighbourhood of good fisheries supplied. Some of the vivaries or fish-pools, and meres even, which once ajfforded abundant supplies, no longer exist, their sites being now green fields; but indications of their former presence are distinct, whilst the positions of weirs on the Severn, the rights of which their owners zealously guarded, may still be pointed out. Sometimes they were subjects of litigation, as with the canons of Lilleshall, who claimed b INTRODUCTION. rights of fishing in the Severn at Bridgnorth, and who obtained a bull from Pope Honorins confirming them in their rights. In 1160 the Abbot of Salop, with the consent of his chapter, is found granting to Philip Fitz- Stephen and his heirs the fishery of Sutton (piscarium de Sutana), and lands near the said fishery. These monks also had fisheries at Binnal, a few miles from Willey ; and it is well known that they introduced into our rivers several varieties of fish not previously common thereto, but which now afibrd sport to the angler. Fishing, it is true, may have been followed more as a remunerative exercise by some members of these religious houses, still it did not fail to com- mend itself as an attractive art and a harmless recreation congenial to a spirit of contemplation and reflection to many distinguished ecclesiastics. That the Severn of that day abounded in fish much more than at present is shown by Bishop Lyttleton, who takes some pains to describe it at Arley, and who explains the construction of the coracle and its uses in fishing, the only difierence between it both then and now, and that of early British times, being that the latter was covered with a horse's hide. INTRODUCTION. 7 A jury, empannelled for the purpose of estimating the value of Arley manor upon the death of one of its proprietors, gave the yearly rental of its fishery at 6s. 8cL, — a large sum in comparison with the value of sixty acres of land, stated to have been 10s., or with the rent of a ferry, which was put down at sixpence. There must have been fine fishing then. Trout were plentiful, so were salmon ; there were no locks or artificial weirs to obstruct the attempts of fish — still true to the instinct of their ancestors — to beat the tide in an upward summer excursion in the direction of its source. The document states that the part of the river so valued " abounded in fish." Note. — The Bishop of Worcester, by his regulations for the Priory of Little Malvern, in 1323, enjoins the prior not to fish in the stew set apart from ancient times for the recreation of the sick, imless manifest utility, to he approved by the Chapter, should sanction it ; in which case he was, at a fit opportunity, to replace the fish which he caught. We fancy it is not difficult to recognise a growing feeling against that separation of religion, recreation, and health which unfor- tiinately now exists, and in favour of re-uniting the three ; and we are persuaded that the "sooner this takes place the better for the nation. CHAPTEE I. THE MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS. Early Features of the Country — The Hawk an acquisition to Sports- men — Hawk aeries — Hawks according to Degrees — Brook and other kinds of Hawking — Hawking and Hunting — A Shropshire Historian's Charge against the Conqueror — Bishops and their Clergy as much given to the Sport as Laymen — The Rector of Madeley— The Merrie Days, &c. Diversified by wood and moor, by lake and sedgy pool, dense flocks of wild fowl of various kinds at one time afforded a profusion of winged game ; and the keen eye and sharp talons of tbe hawk no doubt pointed it out as a desirable acquisition to tbe sportsman long ere be succeeded in pressing it into bis service : indeed it must bave been a marked advance in tbe art wben be first availed bimself of its instinct. Old records supply materials for judg- MARSH A^B FOREST PERIODS. ing of tlie estimation in which, this bird was held by our ancestors, it being not uncommon to find per- sons holding tenements or paying fines in lieu of service to the lord of the fee by rendering a sore sparrow-hawk — a hawk in its first year's plumage. Stringent restrictions upon the liberty the old Roman masters of the country allowed with respect to wild fowl were im- posed ; the act of steal- ing a hawk, and that of taking her eggs, be- ing punishable by im- prisonment for a year and a day. The high- born, with birds be- decked with hoods of silk, collars of gold, and bells of even weight, but of difier- ent sound, appeared according to their rank — a ger-falcon for a king, a falcon gentle for a prince, a falcon of the rock for a duke, a janet for a knight, a merlin for a lady, and a lamere for a squire. From close-pent manor and high-walled castle, to outspread plain and expansive lake or river 10 MARSH AXD FOEEST PERIODS. bank, the gentry of the day sought perditch and plover, heron and wild fowl, many of which the fowling-piece has since driven from their haunts, and some — as the bustard and the bittern, the egret and the crane — into extinction. Mention is often made of hawk aeries, as at Little Wenlock, and in connection with districts within the jurisdiction of Shropshire forests, which seem to have been jealously guarded. The use of the birds, too, appears to have been very much restricted down to the time that the forest-charter, enabling all freemen to ply their hawks, was wrung from King John, when a sport which before had been the pride of the rich became the privilege of the poor. It was at one time so far a national pastime that an old writer asserts that '^ every degree had its peculiar hawk, from the emperor down to the holy- water clerk." * The sport seems to have divided itself into field-hawking, pond-hawking, brook-and- river hawking ; into hawking on horseback and hawking on foot. In foot hawking the sportsman carried a pole, with which to leap the brook, into which he sometimes fell, as Henry YIII. did upon his head in the mud, in which he would have been * Appendix A. MAESH AND FOREST PERIODS. 11 stifled, it is said, had not Jolm Moody rescued him ; whether this Moody was an ancestor of the famous Whipper-in or not we cannot say. Evidence is not altogether wanting to show that during the earlier history of the Marsh period, the gigantic elk (Cervtcs giganteus), with his wide- spreading antlers, visited, if he did not inhabit, the flatter portions of the Willey country ; and it is probable that the wild ox equally afibrded a mark for the arrow of the ancient inhabitants of the dis- trict in those remote times, which investigators have distinguished as the Pile-building, the Stone, and the Bronze periods, when society was in what has been fittingly called the hunter- state. At any rate, we know that at later periods the red deer, the goat, and the boar, together with other " beasts," were huntod, and that both banks of the Severn resounded with the deep notes of " veteran hounds." Of the two pursuits. Prior in his day remarks, "Hawking comes near to himting, the one in the ayre as the other on the earth, a sport as much afiected as the other, by some preferred." That the chase was the choice pastime of monarchs and nobles before the Conquest, and the favourite sport of "great and worthy personages" after, we learn 12 MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS. from old autliors, who, like William Ti\ici, liiints- man to Edward I., have written elaborate descrip- tive works, supplying details of the modes pursued, imd of the kinds of dog which were used. Our Saxon ancestors no doubt brought with them from the great forests of Germany not only their institutions but the love of sport of their forefathers, pure and simple. With them the forests appear to have been open to the people ; and, although the Danes imposed restrictions, King Canute, by his general code of laws, confirmed to his subjects full right to hunt on their own lands, providing they abstained from the forests, the pleasures of which he appears to have had no inclination generally to share with his subjects. He established in each county four chief foresters, who were gentlemen or thanes, and these had under them four yeomen, who had care of the vert and venison ; whilst under these again were two officers of still lower rank, who had charge of the vert and venison in the night, and who did the more servile work. King William curtailed many of the old forest privileges, and limited the sports of the people by prohibiting the boar and the hare, which Canute had allowed to be taken ; and so jealous was he of the privileges of MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS. Id tlie chase that lie is said to have ordained the loss of the eyes as the penalty for kilKng a stag. His Gorman predilections were such that an old Shrop- shire historian, Ordericus Yitalis (born at Atchani), who was at one time chaplain to the Conqueror, charges him with depopulating whole parishes that he might satisfy his ardour for hunting. Prince Hufus, who inherited a love of the chase from his father, is made by a modern author to reply to a warning given him by saying : — '' I love the chase, 'tis mimic war, And the hollow bay of hound ; The heart of the poorest Norman Beats quicker at the sound." King John stretched the stringent forest laws of the period to the utmost, till the love of liberty and of sport together, still latent among the people, compelled him to submit to an express declaration of their respective rights. By this declaration all lands afforested by Henry I. or by Eichard were to be disafforested, excepting demesne woods of the crown ; and a fine or imprisonment for a year and a day, in case of default, was to be substituted for loss of life and members. To prevent disputes with regard to the king's 14 MARSH AND FOREST PERIODS. forests, it was also agreed that tlieir limits should be defined by perambulations ; but as a cbeck upon tbe boldness of ofienders in forests and cbaces, and warrens, and upon tbe disposition of juries to find against tbose wbo were appointed to keep sucb places, it was deemed necessary on tbe other hand to give protection to the keepers. Large sums were lavished by kings and nobles on the kennels and appliances necessary for their diversions. Nor were these costly establishments confined to the laity. Bishops, abbots, and high dig- nitaries of the Church, could match their hounds and hawks against those of the nobles, and they equally prided themselves upon their skill in woodcraft. That the clergy were as much in favour of these amusements as the laity, appears from an old Shrop- shire author, Piers Plowman (Langland), who satiri- cally gave it as his opinion that they thought more of sport than of their flocks, excepting at shearing time ; and likewise from Chaucer, who says, ''in hunting and riding they are more skilled than in divinity." That Eichard de Castillon, an early rector of Made- ley, was a sportsman appears from the fact that when Henry III. was in Shrewsbury in September, 1267, concluding a treaty with Llewellyn, and settKng MAESH AND FOREST PERIODS. 15 sundry little differences with, the monks and bur- gesses there, he granted him license to hunt '^ in the royal forest of Madeley," then a portion of that of the Wrekin. In 1283 also, King Edward per- mitted the Prior of Wenlock to have a park at Madeley, to fence out a portion of the forest, and to form a haia there for his deer. It has been said that Walter, Bishop of Rochester, was so fond of sport, that at the age of fourscore he made hunting his sole employment. The Archdeacon of Richmond, at his initiation to the Priory of Bridlington, is re- ported to have been attended by ninety-seven horses, twenty- one dogs, and three hawks. Walter de Suffield, Bishop of Norwich, bequeathed by wiU his pack of hounds to the king ; but the Abbot of Tavi- stock, who had also a pack, was commanded by his bishop about the same time to break it np. A famous hunter was the Abbot of Leicester, whose skill in the sport of hare hunting was so great, that we are told the king himself, his son Edward, and certain noblemen, paid him an annual pension that they might hunt with him. Bishop Latimer said : ^' In my time my poor father was as diligent to teach me to shoot as to learn me any other thing, and so I think other men did their children. He taught 16 MAESH AND FOREST PERIODS. me Ilow to draw, how to lay my body in my bow, and not draw witli strength of arms as other nations do ; " and the good bishop exclaims with the enthu- siasm of a patriot, " It is a gift of God that He hath given us to excel all other nations withal ; it hath been God's instrument whereby He hath given us many victories over our enemies." Such were the '^merrie days," when the kennels of the country gentry contained all sorts of dogs, and their halls all sorts of skins, when the otter and the badger were not uncommon along the banks of Shropshire streams, and ere the fox had taken first rank on the sportsman's list. An old " Treatise on the Craft of Hunting" first gives the hare, the herte, the wulf, and the wild boar. The author then goes on to say — " But there ben other heastes five of the chase ; The buck the first, the second is the doe, The fox the third, which hath ever hard grace, The fourth the martyn, and the last the roe." ilfi CHAPTEH II. MORFE FOREST. Slorfe one of the Five Eoyal Forests of Shropshire — Its History and Associations — Early British, Eoman, Danish, and Norman Mementoes — Legends and Historical Incidents — Forest Wastes — Old Kames — Hermitage Hill — Stanmore Grove — ^Essex Fall — Foresters — Old Forest Lodge, &c. The hunting ground of the Willey country embraced the sites of five royal forests, the growth of earlier ages than those planted by the ]N"ormans, alluded to by c 18 MORFE FOEEST. Ordericus Yitalis. In some instances they were the growtli of wide areas offering favourable conditions of soil for the production of timber, as in the case of that of Morfe. In others they were the result probably of the existence of hilly districts so sterile as to offer few inducements to cultivate them, as in the case of Shirlot, the Stiperstones, the Wrekin, and of the Clee Hills. Some of these have histories running side by side with that of the nation, and associations closely linked with the names of heroic men and famous sportsmen. Morfe Forest, wjiich was sepa- rated from that of Shirlot by the Severn, along which it ran a considerable distance in the direction of its tributary the Worf, is rich in traditions of the rarest kind, the Briton, the Roman, Saxon, Dane, and Norman, having in succession left mementoes of their presence. Here, as Mr. Eyton in his inva- luable work on the " Antiquities of Shropshire " says, — '^Patriotism, civilisation, military science, patient industry, adventurous barbarism, supersti- tion, chivalry, and religion have each played a part.'' The ancient British tumuli examined and described more than one hundred and thirty years ago by the Rev. Mr. Stackhouse have been levelled by the plough, but " the Walls " at Chesterton, and the MORFE FOEEST. 19 evidence tlie name of Stratford supplies as to Roman occupation, to which. Mr. Eyton refers, as well as the rude fortifications of Burf Castle, constructed by the Danes when they came to recruit after being out- manoeuvred by Alfred on the Thames, remain. At Quatford, a mile and a half west, on three sides of a rock overhanging the Severn, near to Danesford, are trenches cut out of the soKd sandstone which, whether Danish or jSTorman, or in part both, shewed by the vast number of wild boar and red deer remains disclosed a few years ago the success with which the chase had here at one time been pursued. Within the forest were four manors, the con- tinuous estate in Saxon times of Algar, Earl of Mercia, which after the Conquest were granted in their integrity to the first Norman Earl of Shrews- bury, and which in 1086 were held wholly in de- mesne by his son Hugh. The predilections of the first Norman Earl of Shrewsbury for this vast forest, lying between those of Kinver, Wyre, and Shirlot, — the whole of which wide wooded district seems to have been comprehended under the old British name of Coed — are shown by the fact that he built his famous castle on the Severn close by, and founded 20 MORFE FOEEST. there his collegiate church, the stones of which remain to attest its erection by a Norman founder. The legend relating to the erection of the church seems so well to bear out the supposition that Morfe was the favourite hunting ground of the earl that, although frequently quoted, it may not be out of place to give it. In substance it is this : — In 1082, Sir Hoger married for his second wife a daughter of Sir Ebrard de Pusey, one of the chief nobles of France. On coming over to England to join her husband a storm arose which threatened the destruction of the vessel when, wearied with much watching, a priest who accompanied her fell asleep and had a vision, in which it was said : — '^ If thy lady would wish to save herself and her at- tendants from the present danger of the sea, let her make a vow to Grod and faithfully promise to build a church in honour of the blessed Mary Magdalene, on the spot where she may first happen to meet her hus- band in England, especiallj^ where groweth a hollow oak, and where the wild swine have shelter." The legend adds that upon awaking the priest informed his lady, who took the prescribed vow ; that the storm ceased, that the ship arrived safely in port, that the lady met the earl hunting the boar where MOEFE FOREST. 21 an old hollow oak stood, and that at her request, and in fulfilment of her vow, Sir Roger built and en- dowed the church at Quatford, which a few years ago only was taken down and rebuilt. On the high ground a little above the church there are still several trees whose gnarled and knotted trunks have borne the brunt of many cen- turies, two of which are supposed to have sprung 22 MORFE FOEEST. from the remains of the one mentioned in the legend. Xot only legends, but traditions, and some historical incidents, as those brought to light by the Forest EoUs, afford now and then an insight of the sporting kind of life led within the boundary and jurisdiction of the forest and upon its outskirts. The bow being not only the chief weapon of sport but of war, those with a greater revenue from land than one hundred pence were at one time not only permitted but com- pelled to have in their possession bows and arrows, but, to prevent those living within the precincts of the forest killing the king's deer, the arrows were to be rounded. These were sometimes sharpened, and . disputes arose between their owners, the dwellers in the villages, and the overseers of the forest, the more fruitful source of grievance being with the com- moners, who, claiming pasturage for their cows and their horses, often became poachers. On one occa- sion a kid being wounded by an arrow at Atterley, on the "Willey side of the Severn, and the culprit not being forthcoming, a whole district is in misericordid, under the ban of the fierce Forest Laws of the period. On another occasion a stag enters the postern gate of the Castle of Bridgnorth, and the vision of venison MORFE FOREST. 23 within reacli proving too strong for the Castellan, he is entrapped, and litigation ensues. Sometimes the stout foresters and sturdy guardians of the castle, and burgesses of the town, indulge in friendly trials of skill at quarter- staff or archery, or in a wrestling match for a cross-bow, a ram, or a " red gold ring." In Ritson's " Eobin Hood" we read : — " By a bridge was a wrastling, And there taryed was he : And there was all the best yemen Of all th& west countrey. A full fajTe game there was set up, A white bull up y-pight, A great courser with saddle and brydle With gold burnished full bryght ; A payre of gloves, a red golde ringe, A pipe of wyne good fay : What man bereth him best I wis, The prize shall bear away." In 1292, a wrestHng match at a festive gathering on Bernard's Hill takes place, when from ill blood arising from an old feud a dispute ensues, and a forester named Simon de Leyre quarrels with Robert de Turbevill, a canon of St. Mary's, Bridgnorth, over a greyhound, which the latter, contrary to the regulations of the courts, had brought within the forest ; and a jury of foresters, verderers, and re- 24 MORFE FOREST. garders, in pursuance of tlie king's writ, is em- powered to try t]ie case. The evidence adduced shows that the foresters were to blame, the verdict come to being that the men of Brug, although at the wrestling match with bows and arrows, were in no way chargeable with the assault upon the forester. "They- had been indicted for trespass," the jurors said, " not under any inquest taken on the matter, but by one Corbett's suggestion to the Justice of the Forest ; they had been attacked and imprisoned under the warrant of the said Justice, Corbett's grudge being that two men of Brug had once promised him a cask of wine, a present in which the corporate body refused to join." Corbett was pronounced by the jurors '' a malevolent and a procurer of evil." To correct evils like these the " ordinatio " of Edward I. was introduced, containing many bene- ficial regulations, and stating that proceedings had been taken in the forest by one or two foresters or verderers to extort money, also providing that all trespassers in the forest of green hue and of hunting shall be presented by the foresters at the next Swainmote before foresters, verderers, and other officers. In the same year the king MORFE FOREST. 25 confirmed tlie great charter of liberties of the forest. Yarious official reports of this Chace, drawn up from time to time, show how the great forest of Morfe gradually diminished, as the vills of Wor- field and Claverley, and other settlements, extended within its limits, causing waste and destruc- tion at various times of timber. During the Barons' War the bosc of Clayerley was further damaged, it was said, *' by many goats frequenting the cover;" it suffered also from waste by the Earl of Chester, who sold from it 1,700 oak trees. Other wastes are recorded, as those caused by cutting down timber "for the Castle of Bridgnorth," and " for enclosing the yill before it was fortified by a wall." The report further states that " there were few beasts," because "they were destroyed in the time of war, and in the time when the liberty of the forest was conceded." By degrees, from one cause or another, and by one means or another, this, the " favourite chace of English kings and Norman earls, which, so late as 1808, consisted of upwards of 3,820 acres, disappeared, leaving about the names of places it once enclosed an air of quaint antiquity, the very mention of some of which may be inte- 26 MOEFE FOREST. resting. Among tliem are Bowman's Hill, Bow- man's Pit, and "Warrener's Dead Fall — names carrying back ttie mind to times wlien bowmen were the reliance of English leaders in battles fought on the borders, and before strongholds like the Castle of Bridgnorth. Gratacre, and Gratacre Hall, suggest a passing notice of a family which witnessed many such encounters, and which remained associated with a manor here from the reign of Edward the Confessor to the time when Earl Derby sought shelter as a fugitive after the Battle of Worcester. As Camden describes it, the old hall must have been a fitting residence truly for a steward of the forest. It had, in the middle of each side and centre, immense oak trees, hewn nearly square, set with their heads on large stones, and their roots upper- most, from which a few rafters formed a complete arched roof. The Hermitage, with its caves hewn out of the solid sand rock, by the road which led through the forest in the direction of Worfield, meets us with the tra- dition that here the brother of King Athelstan came seeking retirement from the world, and ended his days within sight of the queenly Severn. Besides tradition, however, evidence exists to shew that this MORFE FOREST. 27 eremetical cave, of Saxon origin, under the patronage of the crown, was occupied by successive hermits, each being ushered to the cell with royal seal and patent, in the same way as a dean, constable, or sheriff was introduced to his office ; as in the case of John Oxindon (Edward III, 1328), Andrew Cor- brigg (Edward III., 1333), Edmund de la Marc (Edward III., 1335), and Eoger Boughton (Ed- ward III., 1346). From the frequency of the pre- sentations, it would appear either that these hermits must have been near the termination of their pilgrimage when they were inducted, or that con- finement to a damp cell did not agree with them : indeed, no one looking at the place itself would consider it was a desirable one to live in. Other names not less significant of the former features of the country occur, as Stoneydale, Copy Foot, Sandy Burrow, Quatford Wyches, and Hill House Flat,— where the remains of an old forest oak may still be seen. In addition to these we find Briery Hurst, Eushmoor Hill, Spring Yalley, Stan- more Grove, and Essex Fall, the latter being at the head of a ravine, half concealed by wood, where tradition alleges the Earl of Essex, grandson of the Earl who founded St. James's, a refuge, a Kttle 28 MORFE FOEEST. lower down, for sick and suffering pilgrims, which had unusual forest privileges allowed by royal owners, was killed whilst hunting. Here too, higher up on the hill, may still be seen the remains of the old Forest Lodge, which, with its picturesque scenes, must have been associated with the visits of many a noble steward and forest-ranger. Many a hunter of the stag and wild boar has on the walls of this old Lodge hung up his horn and spear, as he sought rest and refreshment for the night. The names of some of the stewards and other officers of the forest are preserved, together with their tenures and other privileges. By an inquisi- tion in the reign of Henry III., it was found that E-obert, son of Nicholas, and others were seized of ^^Morffe Bosc."* In the 13 Hen. lY., "Worfield had common of pasture in Morffe.'* Besides many tenures (enumerated in Duke's " Antiquities of Shropshire," p. 52), dependent upon the forest, the kings (when these tenures were grown useless and obsolete) appointed stewards and rangers to take care of the woods and the deer ; in the 19 Rich. II., Richard Chelmswick was forester for life : in the 1 Henry lY., John Bruyn was forester ; and in * Inquis. Henry III., incerti temporis, Nu. 6, 156. MORFE FOEEST. 29 the 26tli Henry TV., the stewardships of the forest of Morfe and Shirlot were granted to John Hampton, Esq., and his heirs. Again, we find 9 Henry YII., rot. 28, George Earl of Shrewsbury, was steward and ranger for life, with a fee of 4c/. per day. Orig. 6 Edward YL, William Gatacre de Gatacrc, in com. Salop, had a lease of twenty-one years of the stewardship ; and in the 20th Elizabeth, George Bromley had a lease of twenty- one years of the stewardship, at a rent of 6s. 8d., et de incremento, 12d. ; and 36 Elizabeth, George Powle, Gent., was steward, with a fee of 4d per day. One of the descendants of George Earl of Shrews- bury sold at no very distant period the old Lodge and some land to the Stokes family of Koughton, and the property is still in their possession. The remains of the old Lodge were then more extensive, but they were afterwards pulled down, with the exception of that portion which still goes by the name. As we have said, these places have about them interesting forest associations, reminding us that early sportsmen here met to enjoy the plea- sures of the chase, with a success sometimes told by red-deer bones and wild-boar tusks, dug from some old ditch or trench. Where the plough-share now 30 MORFE FOREST. cleaves tlie sandy soil, the wild-boar roamed at will ; where fat kine feed in pastures green, stout oaks grew, and red-deer leaped ; where the Albrighton red-coats with yelping hounds now meet, the ring- ing laugh of lords and ladies, of bishops and their clergy, hunting higher game, was heard. Then, as good old Scott has said, — " In the lofty arched hall Was s^Dread the gorgeous festival, Then rose the riot and the din Above, beneath, without, within, For from its lofty balcony, Eang trumpet, shawm and psaltery. Their clanging bowls old warriors quaff'd, Loudly they spoke and loudly laugh'd, Whisper' d young knights in tones more mild, To ladies fair, and ladies smiled. The hooded hawks, high perch'd on beam. The clamour join'd with whistling scream, And flapped their wings and shook their bells. In concert with the stag-hounds' yells." % CHAPTER III. ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. Afforestation of Shirlot — Extent — Places Disafforested — Hayes — Foresters — Hunting Lodges — Sporting Priors — Old Tenures — Encroacliments upon Woods by Iron-making Operations — Animals tliat have Disappeared — Eeaction due to a Love of Sport — ^^Hiat the Country would have lost — " The Merrie Greenwood" — Remarkable old Forest Trees, &c. " "Where with puffed cheek the belted hunter blows His wreathed bugle horn." Mr. Eyton tliiiiks the afForestation of Sliirlot was probably suggested by its proximity to tbe Moryille and Chetton manors, where Saxon kings and Mer- cian earls had their respective demesnes, and that Henry I. and his successors, in visiting the Castle of Bridgnorth, or as guests of the Prior of Wenlock, had 32 EOYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. obvious reasons for perpetuating there tlie exclusive rights of a Royal chace. Although Shirlot Forest was separated from that of Morfe by the Severn, its jurisdiction extended across the river to Apley, and embraced places lying along the right bank of the river, in the direction of Cressage. Bridgnorth with its surroundings was not taken out of its juris- diction or thrown open by perambulation till 1301, when it was disafforested, together with Eardington, Much "Wenlock, Broseley, and other places. The extent and ancient jurisdiction of this forest may be estimated by the number of places taken from it at this date, as Benthall, Buildwas, Barrow, Belswardine, Shineton, Posenall, Walton, Willey, Atterley, the Dean, the Bold, Linley, Caughley, Little Caugh- ley, Eowton, Sweyney, Appeleye (the only vill eastward of Severn), Colemore, Stanley, Eucroft, Medewegrene, Cantreyne, Simon de Severn's mes- suage (now Severn Hall), Northleye, Astley Abbot's Manor, La Dunfowe (Dim wall). La Eode (now Rhodes), Kinsedeleye (now Kinslow), Tasley, Crofte, Haley gton (Horton, near Morville), Aldenham, the Bosc of the Earl of Arundel within the bounds of the forest of Schyrlet, which is called "Wiles Wode (^.e. Earl's Wood), Aston Aer, Momerfield (Mor- ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. 33 ville)j Lee, Underdone, "Walton (all tliree near Morville), Upton (now Upton Cresset), Meadowley, Stapeley, Criddon, Midteleton (Middleton Scriven), the Bosc of the Prior of Wenlock, called Lythewode, half the vill of Neuton (Newton near Bold), Fain- tree, Chetton, Walkes Batch (Wallsbatch, near Chetton), Hollycott, Hapesford (now Harpswood), "Westwood (near Harpswood), Oldbury, a messuage at the More (the Moor Ridding), a messuage at La Cnolle (now Knowle Sands), and the Bosc which is called Ongeres. The ancient extent of the forest must have been about twelve miles by Rve. The names of the places mentioned to which the limits of the chace a-re traced are so different in many instances from the present that it may be of interest to give a few of them. From Yapenacres Merwey the boundary was to go up to the Raveneshok (E-avens* Oak), thence straight to the Brenallegrene, near the Cole- herth (Coal Hearth) going up by the Fendeshok (Friends* Oak) to the Dernewhite-ford. Thence up- wards to the Nethercoumbesheved ; and so straight through the Middlecoumbesheved, and then down to Caldewall. Then down through the Lynde to the Mer Elyn. Thence down to Dubledaneslegh, D 34 ROYAL CHASE OF SHIELOT. and then up by a certain watercourse to tlie Pirle ; and so up to Wichardesok ; and so to tlie Punde- fold ; and so down by tbe Sbepewey to tbe Holewe- euen, and then up by a certain fence to Adame's Hale (Adam's Hall), and tbus by tbe assarts wbicb. Jobn de Haldenbam (Aldenbam) bolds at a rent of the king to the corner of Mokeleyes Eowe (Muck- ley Row) ; and thence down to Yapenacres Merwey, where the first land-mark of the Haye begins. There was also, it was said, a certain bosc which the King still held in the same forest, called Banthlegh Haye (Bentley Haye)« In addition to this Haye there was the Haye of Shirlot, opposite to which a portion of the forest in the fifth of Henry III.'s reign was ordered to be assarted, which consisted in grubbing up the roots so as to render the ground fit for tillage. In connection with these Hayes, generally a staff of foresters, verderers, rangers, stewards, and re- garders was kept up ; and forest courts were also held at stated times (in the forest of the Clee every six weeks), at which questions and privileges con- nected with the forest were considered. Philip de Baggesour, Forester of the Fee in the king's free Haye of Schyrlet in 1255, in the Inquisition of EOYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. 35 Hundreds, is said to have under him " two foresters, wlio give him 20s. per annum for holding their office, and to make -a levy on oats in Lent, and on wheat in autumn." "The aforesaid Philip,'' it is said, ^' hath now in the said Haye of Windfalls as much as seven trees, and likewise all trees which are wind-fallen, the jurors know not by what warrant except by ancient tenure." These privileged officers had good pickings, evidently by means of their various time- sanctioned customs, and jolly Kves no doubt they led. In the forty-second of Henry III. Hammond le Strange was steward of this forest, and in the second of Edward I. the king's forester is said to have given the sheriff of the county notice that he was to convey all the venison killed in the forests of Salop, and deliver it at Westminster to the king's larder, for the use of the king's palace. According to the same record, the profits that were made of the oaks that were fallen were to be applied to the building of a vessel for the king. In the nineteenth of Eichard II., Eichard Chelmswick was appointed forester for Hfe ; and in the twenty-sixth of Henry III. the steward- ship both of the forests of Morfe and of Shirlot was granted to John Hampton and his heirs. 36 EOYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. Some of the cliief foresters also lield "Willey, and probably resided there ; at any rate it is not improbable that a building which bears marks of extreme antiquity, between Barrow and Broseley, called the Lodge Farm, was once the hunting lodge. It has underneath strongly arched and extensive J%fpj§ cellaring, which seems to be older than portions of the superstructure, and which may have held the essentials for feasts, for which sportsmen of all times have been famous. "NesLV the lodge, too, is the Bear-Loape, or Deer Leap, a little valley through which once evidently ran a considerable stream, EOYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. 37 and near which, the soil is still black, wet, and boggy. A deer leap, dear loape, or saltory, was a pitfall — a contrivance common during the forest periods, generally at the edge of the chace, for taking deer, and often granted by charter as a privilege — as that, for instance, on the edge of Cank, or Cannock Chace. Sometimes these pitfalls, dug for the purpose of taking game, were used by poachers, who drove the deer into them. It is, therefore, easy to understand why the forest lodge should be near, as a protection. It was usually one of the articles of inquiry at the Swainmote Court whether " any man have any great close within three miles of the forest that have any saltories, or great gaps called deer loapes, to receive deer into them when they be in chasing, and when they are in them they cannot get out again.'' Among sportsmen of these forest periods we must not omit to notice the Priors of the ancient Abbey of Wenlock. The heads of such wealthy establish- ments by no means confined themselves within the limits of the chapter-house. They were no mere cloistered monks, devoted to book and candle, but jolly livers, gaily dressed, and waited upon by well- appointed servants ; like the Abbot of Buildwas, who 38 EOYAL CHASE OF SHIELOT. had for his vassal the Lord of Buildwas Parva, who held land under him on condition that he and his wife should place the first dish on the abbot's table on Christmas Day, and ride with him any whither Chapter House of Wenlock Priory. within the four seas at the abbot's charge. They had huntsmen and hounds, and one can imagine their sporting visitation rounds among their churches, the chanting of priests, the deep-mouthed baying of ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. 39 dogs, early matins, and tlie huntsman's bugle horn harmoniously blending in the neighbourhood of the forest. Hugh Montgomery in his day gave to the abbey a tithe of the venison which he took in its woods, and in 1190 we find the Prior of Wen- lock giving twenty merks to the king that he may " have the Wood of Shirlott to himself, exempt from view of foresters, and taken out of the Regard/' As we have already shown, the priors had a park at Madeley, they had one at Oxenbold, and they also had privileges over woods adjoining the forest of the Clees, where the Cliffords exercised rights ordinarily belonging to royal proprietors, and where their foresters carried things with such a high hand, and so frequently got into trouble with those of the priors, that the latter were glad to accept an arrange- ment, come to after much litigation in 1232, by which they were to have a tenth beast only of those taken in their own woods at Stoke and Ditton, and of those started in their demesne boscs, and taken elsewhere. These boscs appear to have been wood- land patches connecting the long line of forest stretching along the flanks of the Clee Hills with that on the high ground of Shirlot and, as in the case of others even much further removed, their 40 ROYAL CHASE OF SHIELOT. ownership was exceedingly limited. One of the complaints against Clifford's foresters was, that they would not suffer the priors' men to keep at Ditton Priors and Stoke St. Milburgh any dogs not expe- ditedy or mutilated in their feet, nor pasture for their goats. Imbert, one of these priors, was chosen as one of the Commissioners for concluding a truce with Dayid ap Llewellyn in July, 1244. He was subsequently heavily fined for trespasses for assarting, or grubbing up the roots of trees, in forest lands at Willey, Broseley, Coalbrookdale, Madeley, and other places, the charge for trespass amounting to the large sum of £126 13s. 4d A survey of the Haye of Shirlot, made by four knights of the county, pursuant to a royal writ in October 21, 1235, sets forth " its custody good as regards oak trees and underwood, except that great deliveries have been made by order of the king to the Abbeys of Salop and Bildewas, to the Priory of Wenlock, and to the Castle of Brug, for the repairs of buildings, &c." Some curious tenures existed within the jurisdic- tion of this forest, one of which it may be worth while deviating from our present purpose to notice. ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. 41 as it affords an insight into the early iron manufac- turing operations whicli, at a later period, led to the destruction of forest trees, but, at the same time, to the development of the mineral wealth of the dis- trict within and bordering upon the forest. Of its origin nothing is known ; but it is supposed to have arisen out of some kingly peril or other forest inci- dent connected with the chase. It consisted in this, that the tenant of the king at the More held his land upon the condition that he appeared yearly in the Exchequer with a hazel rod of a year's growth and a cubit's length, and two knives. The treasurer and barons being present, the tenant was to attempt to sever the rod with one of the knives, so that it bent or broke. The other knife was to do the same work at one stroke, and to be given up to the king's chamberlain for royal use.* That iron was manufactured at a very early period in the heart of the forests of Shirlot and the Glees, is shown by Leland, who informs us that in his day there were blow-shops upon the Brown Glee Hills in Shropshire, where iron ores were exposed upon the hill sides, and where, from the fact that * For additional particulars respecting tliis interesting tenure we refer the reader to the Appendix B. 42 EOYAL CHASE OF SHIELOT. wood was required for smelting, it is only reason- able to look for them. Historical records and monastic writings, as well as old tenures, traditions, and heaps of slag, tell us that iron had been manu- factured in the midst of these woods from very- remote periods. As far back as 1250, a notice occurs of a right of road granted by Philip de Bent- hall, Lord of Benthall, to the monks of Buildwas, over all his estate, for the carriage of stone, coal, and timber ; and in an old work in the Deer Leap, very primitive wooden shovels, and wheels flanged and cut out of the solid block, and apparently designed to bear heavy weights, were found a short time since, which are now in possession of Mr. Thurs- field, of Barrow, together with an iron axletree and some brass sockets, two of which have on them "P. B.," being the initials of Philip Benthall, or Philip Burnel, it is supposed, the latter having suc- ceeded the former. At Linley, and the Smithies, traces of old forges occur ; so that there is good reason for supposing that knives and other articles of iron may have been manufactured in the district from a very early period. Among the assets, for instance, of the Priory of Wenlock, in the year 1541-2, is a mine of ironstone, at Shirlot, formed for EOYAL CHASE OF SHIELOT. 43 £2 65. Id. per annum; and a forge, described as an lerne Smythee, or a smith's place, in Shirlot, rented at £12 8s. Another forge produced £2 13.s. 4:d. per annum ; and the produce of some other mineral, probably coal, was £5 3s. lOd. These large rents for those days show the advance made in turning to account the mineral wealth of the district, and the superior yalue of mines compared with trees, or mere surface produce. Wherever powerful streams came down preci- pitous channels, little forges with clanging hammers were heard reverberating through the woods as early as the reigns of the Tudors. Their sites now are — " Downy banks damask'd with flowers : " but they, reveal the havoc made of the timber by cutting and burning it for charcoal down to the reign of Elizabeth, when an act was passed to restrict the use for such purposes. These iron-making and mining operations caused the forest to be intersected by roads and tramways, as old maps and reports of the forest shew us ; so that few beasts, except those passing between their more secluded haunts, were to be found there ; and, 44 EOYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. as the stragglers preferred the tender vegetation the garden of the cottager afforded, even these were sometimes noosed, or shot with bows and arrows, which made no noise. To such an extent had destruction of timber in this and other forests in the country been carried, that it was feared that in the event of a foreign war sufficient timber could not be found for the use of the navy. A reaction, however, set in: wealthy ROYAL CHASE OF SHIRLOT. 45 landowners set themselves to work to remedy tlie evil by planting and preserving trees, especially tlie oak ; and many of tlie woods and plantations wkich gladden tlie eye of tlie traveller in passing through the country, and which afford good sport to the Wheatland and Albrighton packs, were the result. To this indigenous and deep-rooted love of sport we are therefore indebted, to a very great extent, for those beautiful woods which adorn the Willey country and many other . portions of the kingdom. But for our woods and the "creeping things" they shelter, we should have imperfect conceptions of those earlier phases of the island : — " When stalked the bison from his shaggy lair, Thousands of years "before the silent air "Was pierced by whizzing shafts of hunters keen." The country would have been wanting in subjects such as Creswick, with faithful expressions of foliage and knowledge of the play of light and shade, has depicted. It would have lost the text-work of those characteristics Constable revelled in, and those Harding gave us in his oaks. We should have lost subjects for the poet as well as for the painter ; for the ballad literature of the countrj?- is redolent of sights and sounds associated therewith. 46 ROYAL CHASE OF SHIKLOT. To come down from the earliest times. How the old Druids reverenced them ! how the compilers of that surprising survey of the country we find in Domesday noted all details concerning them ! what